"Of prifon-gates : " Shall fhine from far, "The foolish fates." This was lofty!-Now name the rest of the players. This is Ercles' vein, a tyrant's vein; a lover is more condoling. QUIN. Francis Flute, the bellows-mender. QUIN. You must take Thisby on you. I FLU. What is Thisby? a wandering knight ? FLU. Nay, faith, let me not play a woman; I have a beard coming. QUIN. That's all one; you shall play it in a mask, and you may speak as small as you will.2 the bellows-mender.] In Ben Jonfon's Masque of Pan's Anniversary, &c. a man of the fame profeffion is introduced. I have been told that a bellows-mender was one who had the care of organs, regals, &c. STEEVENS. 2 -as fmall &c.] This passage shows how the want of women on the old stage was supplied. If they had not a young man who could perform the part with a face that might pass for feminine, the character was acted in a mask, which was at that time a part of a lady's dress so much in use, that it did not give any unusual appearance to the scene: and he that could modulate his voice in a female tone, might play the woman very fuccessfully. It is observed in Downes's Rofcius Anglicanus, that Kynaiton, one of these counterfeit heroines, moved the paffions more strongly than the women that have since been brought upon the stage. Some of the catastrophes of the old comedies, which makes lovers marry the wrong women, are, by recollection of the common use of masks, brought nearer to probability. JOHNSON. Dr. Johnfon here feems to have quoted from memory. Downes does not speak of Kynaston's performance in fuch unqualified Bor. An I may hide my face, let me play Thisby too: I'll speak in a monftrous little voice; -Thisne, Thisne,-Ah, Pyramus, my lover dear; thy Thisby dear! and lady dear! QUIN. No, no; you must play Pyramus, and, Flute, you Thisby. Вот. Well, proceed. QUIN. Robin Starveling, the tailor. STAR. Here, Peter Quince. QUIN. Robin Starveling, you must play Thisby's mother.3-Tom Snout, the tinker. SNOUT. Here, Peter Quince. QUIN. You, Pyramus's father; myself, Thisby's father;-Snug, the joiner, you, the lion's part :and, I hope, here is a play fitted. SNUG. Have you the lion's part written? pray you, if it be, give it me, for I am flow of study.4 terms. His words are" It has fince been difputable among the judicious, whether any women that fucceeded him, (Kynafton,) so sensibly touched the audience as he." REED. Prynne, in his Histriomastix, exclaims with great vehemence through feveral pages, because a woman acted a part in a play at Blackfryars in the year 1628. STEEVENS. 3 you must play Thisby's mother.] There seems a double forgetfulness of our poet, in relation to the characters of this interlude. The father and mother of Thisby, and the father of Pyramus, are here mentioned, who do not appear at all in the interlude; but Wall and Moonshine are both employed in it, of whom there is not the leaft notice taken here. THEOBALD. Theobald is wrong as to this last particular. The introduction of Wall and Moonshine was an after-thought. See Act III. fc. i. It may be observed, however, that no part of what is rehearsed is afterwards repeated, when the piece is acted before Thefeus. STEEVENS. 4-low of study.] Study is still the cant term used in a QUIN. You may do it extempore, for it is nothing but roaring. Bor. Let me play the lion too: I will roar, that I will do any man's heart good to hear me, I will roar, that I will make the duke say, Let him roar again, Let him roar again. QUIN. An you should do it too terribly, you would fright the duchess and the ladies, that they would shriek; and that were enough to hang us all. ALL. That would hang us every mother's fon. Bor. I grant you, friends, if that you should fright the ladies out of their wits, they would have no more difcretion but to hang us: but I will aggravate my voice so, that I will roar you as gently as any fucking dove; I will roar you an 'twere any nightingale.5 QUIN. You can play no part but Pyramus: for Pyramus is a fsweet-faced man; a proper man, as one shall fee in a summer's day; a most lovely, gentleman-like man; therefore you must needs play Py ramus. Вот. Well, I will undertake it. What beard were I best to play it in? QUIN. Why, what you will. Bor. I will discharge it in either your straw-coloured beard, your orange-tawny beard, your purple-in-grain-beard, or your French-crown-colour beard, your perfect yellow. theatre for getting any nonsense by rote. Hamlet afks the player if he can "Study" a speech." STEEVENS, 5 -an'twere any nightingale.] An means as if. So, in Troilus and Creffida : - "He will weep you, an 'twere a man born in April." STEEVENS. 6 -your perfect yellow.] Here Bottom again discovers a QUIN. Some of your French crowns have no hair at all, and then you will play bare-faced."-But, masters, here are your parts: and I am to entreat you, request you, and defire you, to con them by to-morrow night; and meet me in the palace wood, a mile without the town, by moon-light; there will we rehearse: for if we meet in the city, we shall be dog'd with company, and our devices known. In the mean time I will draw a bill of properties, such as our play wants. I pray you, fail me not. Воr. We will meet; and there we may rehearse more obscenely, and courageoufly. Take pains; be perfect; adieu. true genius for the stage by his folicitude for propriety of dress, and his deliberation which beard to choose among many beards, all unnatural. JOHNSON. So, in the old comedy of Ram-Alley, 1611: "What colour'd beard comes next by the window? " I think, a red: for that is most in fashion." This custom of wearing coloured beards, the reader will find more amply explained in Measure for Measure, Act IV. fc. ii. 7 STEEVENS. -French crowns &c.] That is, a head from which the hair has fallen in one of the last stages of the lues venerea, called the corona veneris. To this our poet has too frequent allufions. STEEVENS. 8-properties,] Properties are whatever little articles are wanted in a play for the actors, according to their respective parts, dresses and scenes excepted. The perfon who delivers them out is to this day called the property-man. In The Baffingbourne Roll, 1511, we find " garnements and propyrts." See Warton's History of English Poetry, Vol. III. p. 326. Again, in Albumazar, 1615: "Furbo, our beards, "Black patches for our eyes, and other properties." Again, in Westward-Hoe, 1607 : "I'll go make ready my ruftical properties." STEEVENS. QUIN. At the duke's oak we meet. At the duke's oak we meet. [Exeunt. Hold, or cut bow-ftrings.] This proverbial phrafe came originally from the camp. When a rendezvous was appointed, the militia foldiers would frequently make excuse for not keeping word, that their bow-strings were broke, i. e. their arms unserviceable. Hence when one would give another absolute affurance of meeting him, he would say proverbially-hold or cut bow-strings-i. e. whether the bow-ftrings held or broke. For cut is used as a neuter, like the verb fret. As when we say, the string frets, the filk frets, for the paffive, it is cut or fretted. WARBURTON. This interpretation is very ingenious, but somewhat difputable. The excuse made by the militia foldiers is a mere fuppofition, without proof; and it is well known that while bows were in use, no archer ever entered the field without a fupply of Strings in his pocket; whence originated the proverb, to have two Strings to one's bow. In The Country Girl, a comedy by T. B. 1647, is the following threat to a fidler : fiddler, strike; "I'll ftrike you, else, and cut your begging bowstrings." Again, in The Ball, by Chapman and Shirley, 1639: have you devices to jeer the reft? Luc. All the regiment of 'em, or I'll break my bow- The bowstrings in both these instances may only mean the Strings which make part of the bow with which musical inftruments of feveral kinds are struck. The propriety of the allufion I cannot fatisfactorily explain. Let the curious reader, however, confult Afcham's Toxophilus, edit. 1589, p. 38. b. STEEVENS. To meet, whether bow-strings hold or are cut, is to meet in all events. To cut the bowstring, when bows were in use, was probably a common practice of those who bore enmity to the archer. "He hath twice or thrice cut Cupid's bowstring, (fays Don Pedro in Much Ado about Nothing,) and the little hangman dare not shoot at him." MALONE. Hold, or cut cod piece point, is a proverb to be found in Ray's Collection, p. 57, edit. 1737. COLLINS. |